


you're a ghost

by justdk



Series: keep it together [6]
Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Ghosts, how to tag this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-07
Updated: 2019-12-07
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:00:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21701830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justdk/pseuds/justdk
Summary: One of Noah's old friends from Mountain View High discovers that Noah is back but that he's a ghost
Relationships: Noah Czerny & Original Character(s)
Series: keep it together [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1560091
Kudos: 14
Collections: Czernsgiving 2019 A Noah Week





	you're a ghost

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Czernsgiving Day 6: Afterlife
> 
> Title from Ghost by Sir Sly
> 
> I had so much fun imagining some of Noah's skater bros and thinking about what they would do if they saw him again

What had happened was that Josh had been called in to work the late shift at Dollar City and he was high as fuck. His manager, Tilda, seemed to intuit this but rather than bust him for it she had muttered _sweet shitake mushrooms_ and given him the task of restocking instead of handling the register.

Josh could have _totally_ handled the register. No one was even in the store, let alone buying anything. Tilda got to stand there sneakily reading her romance novel while Josh restocked packs of beef ramen and shoved more ceramic mugs with saying like _rise and shine and coffee!_ and _Cat Life_ onto the shelves. He had “Blister in the Sun” stuck in his head and the chorus whined on repeat. This was not how he had planned to spend his night off. He’d had lofty plans of going over to see the boys, playing X-Box, making pizza rolls, and drinking whatever Justin had in the fridge. They’d all stay up too late and drive into DC the next day to meet friends and skate and party.

He had just finished placing the last of the one dollar wine glasses on the shelf when he heard a crash from the aisle over and Tilda’s aggrieved “ _C’mon!_ ” A boy shouted back in an abrasive, acidic voice, “ _Don’t get excited, I’ll pay for it_.”

Josh wanted to slink to the back for more boxes but Tilda craned her neck and stared laser beams at him until he shuffled forward to retrieve the roll of paper towels she held out. _For fuck’s sake_. He sighed and took the towels, heading towards the disturbance. There he found two boys: one looking too posh for Dollar City and the other looking too badass for Dollar City. A raven was also in attendance. Both boys were staring at each other with matching expressions of shock and confusion. Even the bird looked startled.

Josh was just starting to move towards them when a _third boy_ appeared. Literally appeared. Out of thin air. He was gasping and looked too pale to be real. But that wasn’t what made Josh’s legs give out and sent him staggering against the shelf beside him.

The boy was Noah Czerny. _His friend Noah Czerny._ Noah, who had vanished seven years ago. Noah, who had recently been proclaimed dead for seven years, murdered in a lonely stretch of woods. The killer, it was rumored, had been that douchebag Barrington Whelk.

But here was Noah, physically unchanged, like he had stepped out of his yearbook photo. (Josh had seen the yearbook because – of all the silly ideas – Noah had made him sign it even though Josh and the other skater boys went to Mountain View, not Aglionby).

Noah was… Josh didn’t know. He was dead. He was in Dollar City. He was staring mournfully at a puddle of water and glitter and glass while the other two boys exclaimed over his appearance. Josh caught a few of the words but _ley line_ were the only ones that made it through his muddled state of shock. Nothing made sense.

His stomach heaved and Josh scrambled away, hurrying to the back while Tilda whisper-yelled at him to _get back here_. He barely made it to the small staff bathroom before he threw up his dinner and lunch. It was awful. He sank to the floor, his head hanging between his knees, and he tried to breathe and think. But all he could think was _Noah Noah Noah_

—–

When he totally Rosy and Shaun and Tyler and Javi about it they told him he was tripping. No one believed him. He asked Tilda to pull up the footage for the night, giving a bullshit reason about one of the boys leaving something behind, and she had laughed at him. “You think those shitty cameras actually work?” she’d snorted. “Not a chance.”

The boys didn’t come back to Dollar City and school was out; Josh had no way of tracking them down. Clearly they didn’t move in the same circles because they didn’t show up at any of the places he hung out at. He mentioned it, partly out of frustration, to his ex, Cialina. To his surprise she immediately perked up and said, “Yeah I know those guys. They come to Nino’s all the time, mostly to talk to Blue Sargent. You know, the _psychic’s daughter_.”

Josh did know because, in a lot of ways, Henrietta was a small town and he’d lived there all his life. So the next night he arrived when Blue was scheduled to work, sat in her section, and ordered a large pizza. He invited Javi because, out of all the boys he had run with during high school, Javi had also been tight with Noah. Of course he didn’t tell Javi that they were stalking a dead boy, he’d just sent a text **free pizza, bro. nino’s 6pm** along with a string of pizza emojis. The pizza emoji had never failed him.

Javi joined him and was in good spirits and got really into this overly detailed ‘summary’ of whatever the fuck was happening in his favorite TV show. Josh was only half paying attention. He kept looking out the window, waiting for the Aglionby boys to arrive. He also had to keep himself from asking the waitress, Blue, how she knew Noah Czerny and by the way did she know that Noah was dead and what the fuck was up with that?

He was on his third refill of Mountain Dew and the pizza had been demolished to crusts that he was gnawing on because _food_ when the boys arrived. There were only four of them but they seemed to take up more space than anyone else. Their faces all turned to find Blue and she visibly brightened when she saw them. But Josh only had eyes for Noah. He smacked Javi’s arm and gestured frantically at the group of teens. He didn’t say anything, partly because he wasn’t sure if he was actually seeing Noah or if he was in some weird trip that wouldn’t stop.

But then Javi’s jaw dropped and a piece of pizza crust tumbled from his open mouth onto the table. His eyes were huge and he looked, quite literally, like he’d seen a ghost.

—–

So this was what happened. They didn’t try to meet Noah. Josh wasn’t sure how things worked for ghosts and was afraid that if they – friends from Noah’s past – tried to talk to him now that he would go away forever. It was like that time traveler paradox or something, right? But that didn’t stop them from low key stalking their old friend. Javi started attending mass at St. Agnes and sometimes Josh would go, just so they could catch an occasional glimpse of Noah seated in a row with three striking looking boys.

Josh learned that Noah’s new friend group consisted of some rather well known Aglionby boys: Richard Campbell Gansey III, Ronan Lynch, and Adam Parrish. Where those boys went, there too went Noah. For the most part. He could also be found around the enigmatic Blue Sargent but Josh wasn’t brave enough to visit 300 Fox Way. Get a glimpse of his future? No thanks.

The summer passed and Henrietta got _stranger_. And scary. People _died_. People like Joseph Kavinsky, who Josh had met a few times at his parties but generally avoided because that guy had some bad mojo. It was a weird time. The dead walked among them and Josh was starting to believe in all sorts of things. He got Cialina to buy him some teas and crystals from Fox Way. He bought a rabbit’s foot, too, though it was actually fake because _rabbits_. He looked up protection charms and sigils and redecorated his skateboard. And that’s when he got the idea.

He called up Javi and they met up in Javi’s garage and got to work. Javi was the artist of the group, the one who created the best tags and stencils; Josh had never progressed past lopsided shrooms and anatomically incorrect dicks. But Javi had a gift. He took the pictures Josh had provided and made a sharp stencil of Noah’s face with a saint’s halo and surbursts around it. Noah’s face was turned up towards the heavens and his palms were cupped and reverently nestled between them was a cracked snow globe. It was simple and elegant and haunting. Underneath, in Javi’s trademark script, were the words: _Noah Lives_.

—–

The stencil went up all over Henrietta in a rainbow of colors. Some places had entire walls dedicated to the stencil repeated over and over, one hundred faces of Noah Czerny raised in rapture. They took the stencil to DC and then it passed around their network of friends and friends’ friends. Levi took it to Jersey, Manuel took it to Miami, Dani took it to Atlanta. It got around, spreading on freight trains, splashed on abandoned billboards, daringly sprayed on overpasses. _Noah Lives_.

—–

One day Noah wasn’t there. It was late autumn, almost winter, and Noah was gone. Josh _felt_ it, he knew he did. Noah didn’t come back to Nino’s or St. Agnes. He wasn’t seen with the Aglionby boys or Blue. He was gone.

Except he was everywhere. On buildings and playgrounds and the backs of street signs. Noah Czerny might seem gone but Josh now knew – no one was ever truly gone.

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me on tumblr @dkafterdark


End file.
